Microsoft Readies Quincy Data Center

Microsoft's massive new data center in Quincy, Wash. is scheduled to "go live" on March 27, according to the San Antonio Express-News, which got a tour of the new facility as an advance preview of a similar data center Microsoft is planning in San Antonio. The paper notes that there's no sign in front of the 470,000 square foot center, "but everyone in town knows where it's located." An excerpt:

It's easy to get lost inside Microsoft's main building, which contains long halls with a tile floor and a maze of rooms centering around five 12,000-square-foot brain centers that contain tens of thousands of computer servers. Each server room has two adjoining rooms lined with refrigerator-sized air-conditioning units to keep the temperature between 60 to 68 degrees Fahrenheit. Another room contains row after row of batteries to kick in for 18 seconds if a power failure should ccur before the truck-sized backup generators fire up.

The new Microsoft facility is one of three major data center construction projects in Quincy, a small town in central Washington state with abundant supply of open space and cheap hydroelectric power. Yahoo and Sabey Corp. are also planning large facilities in the Quincy area.